here lie buckies

I think it’s the outsider POV to the Clegan relationship and how easily their dynamic can be misunderstood, because it’s truly only Gale and John who see each other clearly.

Would love another snippet if you’re still working on it, but otherwise just wanted to let you know that it is living in my head rent free (like all of your fics)!

I actually tried to work on this one the other day!! I got a bit self-conscious about it, but I still like the premise and every time I rewatch parts of MOTA with Curt in them, I’m reminded of how malleable an interpretation of his behaviour around the Buckies can be. I have particular thoughts about the bar scene (and it’s actually this scene that’s the basis for my ideas about past CurtBucky in ITIL).

But okay the limerance fic!! These are the first 500 words (under a cut), because I don’t actually know when I’m going to be finishing it:

The curveball is that this one is fucking blond.

Every other fuck-of-the-month that Bucky has brought round for as long as Curt’s known him—which is a long-ass time—has been a dark-haired slip of a thing. They’ve all without exception been brunette, sometimes curly, sometimes also with blue eyes, and it made good material for ribbing Bucky about his untold levels of narcissism. Curt would tease him, call his hookups The Other Bucky or Clone Kink instead of learning their actual name, and within a month they’d be gone anyway so it didn’t matter.

Then, a week or two later, there’d be another.

This one, though. This one is fucking blond, and though still not quite as tall as Bucky is definitely taller than Curt, and when he speaks he sounds like a cowboy and he moves with the ease of a dancer. They’re always pretty, of course they are, because Bucky has that face and that size and that powerful pull—pheromones, or something—but this one, well. It’s obscene, is what it is. People who go to book launch events aren’t supposed to look like that.

Bucky had asked if Curt wanted to go with him, that night. Curt remembers it, because it was a party at a bookstore for Bucky’s friend Alex and his first graphic novel, but Curt doesn’t know Alex and it honestly sounded like a bit of a drag, so he’d stayed in and played poker with his roommate’s buddies instead. It was only a couple days later, when Curt had asked Bucky if he wanted to grab a beer and see a movie, that Bucky had said, “Can’t. Got a date with a guy from the book party.”

And now, here he is: blond, and pouty-lipped, and golden-lashed, and angle-jawed; husky drawl and easy sprawl and legs long in his jeans. He had his arm spread over the back of a chair while Bucky got him a drink, and he leaves it there after Bucky sits down. The group has been talking around him, the way they’re used to talking around Bucky’s hookups (Curt had caught a raised eyebrow from Benny after they’d walked in together; he’s not the only one who thinks these things), and he hasn’t been making any effort to involve himself anyway. When Bucky sets the drink in front of him, his broad hand then drops to the guy’s thigh, spreading and squeezing. The smile he gives Bucky is a flicker. As Curt watches, Bucky leans in, and he can’t hear it over the noise of the bar from all the way across the table, but he swears that Bucky asks, “You okay?”

😌😌😌😌

Love thinking about slutty Gale 😆 And those YSL jewels are absolutely stunning. I think they suit him perfectly 🫦

Now I'm thinking about @girlswiththecurls's Barbarian general and hotass concubine for the win? (to be honest, i think about them and Valentine all the time 😆), so… I like YSL bracelets too 😍

a place on earth with you

Explicit | 9.4k | Ch: 4/5

John holds the position like he’s about to bail, muscles locked, the whole, big body of his waiting for the order. He’s wearing a khaki work shirt today, the span of his back stretches and contracts with each breath, reminding Gale of the deserts in Algeria. They’ve come so far since then. So far that Gale doesn't believe luck would turn against John now. Maybe Gale's just a gambler like his father, thinking like that, betting on odds that don't favor anyone. But it wouldn't make sense if the whole point of surviving all of it was just to have the most important thing taken away in the end.

/

Salt Drops, Chapter two: to a firefly by the sea

When he finally lifts the next block, resisting the urge to wipe the mucus from his tip lip with one cod-covered wrist, a second pair of gloves reaches for the one stacked beneath it. John looks to his left and finds a slim figure, slightly shorter than him, with broad but still skinny shoulders, lifting as well with a quiet grunt. John heaves his in first, stepping back out of the spit of the chopper a second too late to not get sprayed again. Cleven’s boy does the same, though with far more grace and less coating by flying offal. 

“Any tips?” John asks, brushing his gloves off. 

“Keep your mouth shut.” 

John’s companion does just that, lips pressed tight together and brow furrowed as he lifts with a grunt. When he turns, John holds a fishy hand out to shake. “Bucky,” he says. 

“Gale.” He takes John’s hand, a firm clasp, single shake, too young to be taken as reserved so it just comes off shy. Gale’s cheeks are suntanned and wind-chapped, his hair blown off his forehead and stuck there by salt. 

“Gale? That’s what they named my buddy’s grandmother.” 

“Well, it’s my name.” Gale reaches for another block, hiding the flush in his cheeks.